Chapter I: 1901-1905

The worst in being reborn was the first years.
The previous time, she had been lucky enough to have most of her first life memories sealed off emotionally from her – but leveling up in her Hallows skill, the skill that dealt with her godly powers, had broken this seal.

Because of that, the feelings of her first two life were still strong, and overwhelming for her young mind. Thankfully, her meditation skill had followed her from her life as the Vongola Shadow, and it did help her a lot – along with making her one of the calmest baby ever seen.

But what truly made those first years hell was her father.
Oh, don't get her wrong – even if a bit distant, Von Hohenheim wasn't a bad father, her Soul Art, the holy skill she'd developed in her previous life let her know that the man truly did love his wife and children.
But that same skill also let her feel the hundred of thousands of suffering souls bound to her father – and because of that, being near her father made her feel as if she was drowning in a sea of people, seen and heard only by her. Well, at least finding part of the missing souls Death had been asking about wasn't all that hard even if it did raise the problem about what she would do about them - not that she really could do all that much for now, her mind might be advanced, her control over her body still had to be regained by her own hard work.
Yet again, meditation was he salvation as she used and abused it to learn to ignore a bit the uncomfortable feeling that followed her father's presence everywhere.

As for her Soul-Bound items, like the notification had said, they were in her otherwise empty Inventory. Except for one glaring and inexplicable exception. She had been born to this world with her Soul Link in her hair, as if it had grown there like another, strange hair lock.
Of course, her parents had wondered why their baby girl had been born with a delicate silver chain and its pearl, fang and feather ornaments in her hair – but there wasn't any way to find out, and they soon grew used to it. As for her, she had mainly been surprised, but thankful – because they would probably had had even more questions if they had seen the marking on her face.

The two blood red claw marks under her eyes, proof that she had accomplished the coming of age rite of the canine youkai and the faded lightning-shaped scar of her first life weren't things baby were supposed to be born with, and her Soul Link had the useful ability to hide those, thanks to the illusionary pearl the golden kitsune Shippo had gifted her decades ago.
The other marks hidden by the pearl, a small round tattoo at the base of her left hand fingers representing her mastery of Soul Art and the Deathly Hallows symbol within the Arcobaleno Pacifier on her inner right wrist were less noticeable – and the echoes of her husband's love in the latter mark had been yet another mean to keep calm whenever her emotions were getting to be too much for her young body.

As for Padfoot – as expected, her loyal companion had found her within days of her birth, and had lived just outside the house ever since. Her parents had bee wary of the dog at first, but he was still a pup, and never acted aggressive toward them so they let him be – and as soon as their daughter could walk, he was following her everywhere.
So used to the dog's presence as they were, it took them nearly three years to note that he didn't grown, still stuck as the same overly cute puppy he'd been when he appeared near their house for the first time. They found it strange, but chalked it up to some genetically anomaly the dog had been born with...

¤.¤.¤

"Ari! Come on Ari!"
Ariana smiled and ran to catch up with her elder brothers, Edward impatiently waving at her.
The two of them were already near the large tree that gave his shape not far from their home, playing with a little blond girl – but this blond had much lighter hair, as the Elric shade of golden blond was unique to them...

Winry Rockbell was five, just like Ariana's elder brother Edward, and was their nearest neighbor. The little tomboy lived with her parents, both of them doctors, and her grand-mother, granny Pinako, an old automail mechanics.
Ariana loved to spent hours with Winry and granny Pinako watching the old woman work her magic – and for Ariana, it really was magic, in a world that lacked so many of the technologies she was used to, to see something like the automail granny Pinako made...

Of course, she also spent a lot of time with her brothers spying into their father's study. She may know that alchemy was considered a science, it still was the nearest thing to real magic in this world.
She was nearly at the top of the small slope when she changed her mind and slowed down a bit, letting the tall man that had been trailing behind catch up with her.
"Not going to join them?"

She glance toward the tall silhouette of her father as he caught up with her, then answered "No, I'll stay with you."
If there was one thing she was happy about, it was the fact that she learned her new birth language far faster than she had learned Japanese – thanks among other things, to the consequent intelligent boost given to her by both her Ravenclaw Inheritance and Von Hohenheim Inheritance.
More impressive maybe was the fact that despite her Ravenclaw Inheritance, she was just able to keep up with her brothers, both of them having, after inspection of their Character Informations, a True Genius Perk that gave them a consequent boost in both Intelligence and Wisdom at each birthday.

"But you don't like being near me." her father casually stated
Ariana gave him another glance – the downfall of living with geniuses was that it wasn't easy to hide things from them.
"The screams of the souls you host aren't really pleasant." she admitted "But I can also feel that it isn't something you did to yourself." a shrug "But it's not as if you're going to be here much longer..."

Her brothers maybe intelligent but when it came to human interactions, they were far less skilled that Tsunayoshi had been as her twin – as such, she was the only one that had been able to read the new expression that had crept in her father's eyes in the last few months.

He was desperately searching for something, and for that he would leave them.

Sometimes, Ariana wondered if there was some kind of curse against parental figures in her life...
Von Hohenheim wasn't surprised at the first part of her answer – but he didn't expect the second part, that was clear. Finally, after a moment, he asked "And you don't care about it?"
"It's not that I don't care." she denied – despite the unpleasantness of the multiples souls hidden within him, she had grown to love the gentle man that was her new father "It's that I can't prevent you from leaving and I know it."

"Don't you wonder about the souls that I host?"
"Will you answer if I ask?" she counter-asked
At that, he took even more time to think – his first answer would have been negative, but looking into the much too knowledgeable eyes of his youngest child, he paused.
"I will." he eventually answered, before gesturing for her to sit down

She did so, leaning against him, much to his surprise, and Padfoot in her arms, as he started his tale.
It was the tale of a young, nameless slave identified only a by a number – 23 – cleaning his master's laboratory – and the tale of said master's masterpiece, a thing called homunculus. A tale that took place during her father's youth, more than four centuries ago.
The homunculus was far more knowledgeable than any human, born from the master's experiments with humans and alchemy, but he was also stuck in a small, cramped bottle, condemned to die if the small conteneur was ever broken...

As the boy and the homunculus talked, friendship grew between them, and the being without a body taught to the nameless slave and gave him a name. Von Hohenheim shared his knowledge with the other slaves, and gained the favor of his master, becoming his assistant and gaining more and more knowledge about alchemy, his inborn intelligence shinning for the first time in his life.
Then, the master and his homunculus were called in front of the aging king, who had a demand for the small being stuck in his jar – immortality.

The answer to that demand was monstrous, but the king did not know it yet – for years, he had laborers dig a large circle all around the country; for 'irrigation', he said to the people, who praised their king for his thoughtfulness. Of course, it was but a lie, and when the circle had been drawn and blood spilled by the king's men under the guise of halting rebels, the transmutation circle that activated brought only death to the prosperous nation.

In one night, all the kingdom disappeared, souls wrenched out from their bodies to feed the gigantic alchemy circle...

"The homunculus had used the king for years, baiting him with tales of immortality, but when the moment came there were only two people standing in the center of the circle. Him, and me. Half the souls stuck into me, destroying and recreating my body to what it is today, the other half in the newly made body of the homunculus."
"But why did he made you immortal too?"
"In his own twisted way, it was his way or repaying me." at the interrogative glance sent his way he elaborated "The homunculus is part of the Truth hidden behind the Gate of Alchemy, bound to our world thanks to my blood during my master's experiment."

"So he considered you his father." she answered to her own question, filling away the unknown words for latter and wondering if it had any link with god in charge of this world
"Probably. After that we each went our own way, he to the West, and I to the East..."
Von Hohenheim had taught alchemy to the people of the East to show his gratitude to those that helped him when he was at his lowest, still trying to come to terms with the despicable act made by the homunculus.
It took him decades to realize that said homunculus' plans were far from over.

"While I had become know as the Philosopher of the West to the Xingese, Amestris was born, and had it's own Philosopher..."
"You mean..." Ariana eye's widened "The Philosopher of the East is the homunculus?"
"He is, and it's because of him that I must leave."
"What is he planning?"
"The same thing he did with Xerxes, only on a larger scale."
"But he's already got an immortal body, what more could he want?"

Her father answered by a sad smile "This, I don't know... Only that he's the one hidden behind our government and has been for as long as the country has existed."
"He used a million souls to grant the two of you immortality..." muttered the little girl "Who knows what he could do with fifty millions..." her eyes were serious when she turned toward the father "This is something that you must do, but not something you'll manage alone." she warned before letting out a sigh "And don't be gone too long, or we'll forget you."

The man smiled – she had said 'we', but he could clearly hear what she truly meant, as her eyes trailed on her two older brothers. He'd been afraid, when each of his children were born, of what it would meant for them to have a monster as he was for father, much more so when he'd seen the improbable silver ornament she was born with and those eyes, far too old for a three year old.
But whatever it was that made his daughter so different, it was a good kind of different...
He felt better about leaving, knowing that the youngest would take care of the family.

Before fall came, Von Hohenheim left.
Even if she smiled for her children, it was easy to see that Trisha Elric deeply missed her husband – and all three of them had regularly caught her crying when she didn't know they were there.

By the end of the first week, Ed had managed to lock-pick the door of their father's office, and and dragged his siblings into studying the heavy tomes – because mother always smiled when they talked about doing alchemy when they grew up, just like their father. And who said they had to wait?
About the same time as her older brother talked her into studying alchemy, Ariana's first quest appeared in Chaos' Game...

[Life Quest! To make a mother smile
Goal: get to rank 5 in Earth Alchemy
Reward: +5XP per goal, 1 beginner tome of Earth Alchemy upon completion]

The three siblings had spent the following week in the dusty office, and with the motivation of making their mother smile, the boys had revealed their genius mind, something they never had needed before.
In seven days, they had learned as much as older alchemy students took months to learn.

At school during the day, they ignored their teacher to pursue their new interest, much to the despair of the old woman – but Rosembool was a small village, and they couldn't do much more for the intelligent mind than let them find their own interest and keep on educating the more normal students.
Seeing that Winry was feeling a bit left out, Ariana had invited the older girl – but alchemy hadn't held her attention more than a few minutes. Rather than give up on spending time with her friends, she came back the next day – with a heavy book on automail lent by granny Pinako.

[Goal complete!+5XP
Goal update: transmute something for mother]
[Level up! Your are now level 2!
+1PP]

The new goal hadn't been hard, Ariana swiftly dragging her brothers along and forcing them to show off their new talent before doing the same. The two boys, that had been a bit cross at being dragged away from their books at first soon cheered up when seeing Trisha's proud smile, remembering that she had been the reason why they even started studying said books.

The following months had been spent studying more and more to then show off to their mother, whose smile was always a bit brighter when they distracted her with their alchemy – and the weekly quest to transmute something for Trisha was one Ariana never missed, because though the experience gain wasn't all that impressive with only one measly experience point reward, the smile it never failed to put on their mother's face was priceless.
But as winter drew nearer, Ariana could soon see that their mother seemed more and more weary, and with it, fear seized her.

Up until now, she had mainly noted the absence of certain technologies and adapted – but right now, she was feeling keenly the lack of medical facilities as advanced as those she had had access to as the Vongola Shadow, or the lack of Sun Flames to heal people.
With Winry's parents gone to the front to heal people, there was no competent doctor in Rosembool. Naturally, the next thing she thought about was alchemy – but human alchemy was forbidden; then she remembered about her father talking about the Xingese in the days after he shared his story with her.

Alkahestry, contrary to alchemy, was known for it's healing applications.

¤.¤.¤

And so, Ariana started to go thought Von Hohenheim's books – and came up against her next big obstacle. She didn't spoke, nor read Xingese...
Putting Amestrian alchemy aside, she soon was deep into the old tomes, trying to guess at the unknown language – then she went into town, talking with the men that did the desert crossing to Xing, and started asking them about the language – and thanked Von Hohenheim for the Charisma boost her father had given her, as even the harshest men seemed to melt in front of the cute little girl.

With a basic grasp on Xingese, she went back to Von Hohenheim's tomes – and started making basic progress in alkahestry, which started to increase her Water Alchemy skill. It had surprised her, since the books said that Alkahestry dealt with the flow of energy deep under the planet's crust – that crust being the one used by the Amestrian Earth-based alchemy she had simply assumed it meant it was Earth-based alchemy too – but apparently, the key point in alkahestry was liquid flow, which in turn linked it to water rather than earth.

"What are you doing?"
Ariana's eyes widened – she hadn't thought her mother would wake up, what with how tired she had been looking recently. Finally, she admitted "Alkahestry."
"On me?" asked a dubious Trisha – it was after all well known that alchemy wasn't to be used on humans
"Alkahestry is more axed toward healing than alchemy. This is to help with exhaustion." explained the little girl, nervously twirling one hair-lock around her finger "You are sick, and I'm not skilled enough to heal you, but if you're less tired you won't be as susceptible to whatever it is that is affecting you."

Trisha's smile faltered – the woman had thought she hid it well enough, but like always, her daughter had surprised her with her insight.
Parenting geniuses like her kids were wasn't all that easy - but in some way it was both harder, and easier with her youngest - because she always felt like she had even less to teach to the girl than her two boys that may be intelligent still had to be steered in the right direction; as a mother it would have been a bit disheartening hadn't her daughter's love for their small family been so evident.

So, caving in under the large, expressive and hopeful golden eyes that were far too aware for such a little girl, she did the only thing she could for her daughter.
With a smile, she nodded for the little girl to go ahead – and with a flash, the Xingese art did its work, making a bright smile blossom on the small girl's face.
If they hadn't seen that their mother was tired, her two brothers realized soon enough that she was feeling better, and connected it easily enough with their young sister new obsession for alkahestry.
So, with his usual bluntness, Edward confronted her head on.

"Why didn't you tell us that mom was sick?"
Edward looked angry – but Ariana knew him well enough to understand that it wasn't aimed toward her, but himself, for having missed the signs.
"She wouldn't want you to worry." she answered simply
"She wouldn't want you to worry either, yet you did, and you cured her!" the eldest Elric sibling protested hotly
"I didn't cure her." she sighed back, voice heavy with the admission of the failure that was eating away at her "I can't, I don't know enough to cure her, this..." she gestured toward the circle she had used, or rather one of the trial circles she had used on herself "This is just to help with tiredness, it does nothing on the sickness itself." she dropped her head "And for all our vaulted genius, it would still take me far too much time to learn enough..."

¤.¤.¤

Edward and Alphonse eyes darkened at that, finally seeing that even if she was fine physically, mentally their sister too was nearly exhausted, trying in vain to do something she knew she couldn't - yet not able to bring her to stop herself either, needing to feel that she was doing something.
Sitting briskly by her side, Edward took the heavy tome from her hands "So, how is Xingese read anyway?" he demanded
From his place on Ariana's head, Padfoot gave the boy a doggy grin of approval.

And the three siblings went back to their studies, all three working on the same thing once more. It soon came apparent that the brothers had more difficulties with water alchemy than their sister had – until she had the inspiration to train with them in the small river than ran near the Rockbell's house.
They spent a few hours in the watercourse, coming home freezing, as it was still the middle of winter, but looking at the water flow had helped both boys visualize what they should be searching for under the earth's crust, and they finally made progress in the practical side of alkahestry, instead of being stuck to the theory.

But day by day, the sickness progressed and even Ariana and her brother's alkahestry wasn't sufficient anymore, as Trisha was gradually confined to her bed for longer and longer periods of time.
Edward's anger was growing at their own powerlessness, and each time their mother's eyes strayed to the family picture by her bedside, he would leave, unable to look at the absent man who knew so much more than them, who should have been here saving mother.

"Where the fuck is this bastard when we need him!"
"You know he wouldn't have left if he could help it." a voice by his side softly stated
The boy's eyes widened – Ariana had a gift for walking silently, and he hadn't heard her approaching in the backyard covered in snow. But his surprise didn't distract him long from the fury boiling inside of him.

"I don't." he denied "Because the bastard left without saying anything, and hasn't come home even though mom's sick!"
"He didn't want to say goodbye." Ariana explained "I heard him talk with mom."
"Still, he should be here, not wherever he is." the anger was still there, but colder – it wasn't really that he resented his father even if it was part of it, more than he despised his own powerlessness and needed someone to blame "Mother would be happier if he was here."

"She would be." Ariana agreed "But she also let him go."
"She shouldn't have! Nothing is worth leaving your family behind!"
"Family shouldn't be left behind." Ariana nodded, unable to deny this affirmation – because family had been an important part of her life as a Vongola, and she had yearned for family as a Potter; because just like she had said to him, he shouldn't have gone away for too long when he had such young children waiting for him at home

Because Ariana may have already given up on having a father figure in this life too, Ed and Al shouldn't have to give up too, and yet – yet they already were, because their father was missing at the most important moment in their young life.
And though she understood why her father had left, her heart still broke each time she saw her mother cry, her eldest brother rage or her second brother smile sadly.

At the eve of the new year, alkahestry reached its limits, and Trisha Elric passed away in her sleep.

¤.¤.¤

"How can such a young man already have the eyes of the killer?"
This was what his teacher asked him the first time they met.
Of course, he didn't know – he didn't know why or how, but had already decided what he'd do about it. After all, he had been born with eyes far too old and cold for any child, and had grown up taking in the state of his birth country with these eyes – and so, he would put these eyes to good use in the only way he could think of.

"So you want to become a military dog, eh?" disapproval was evident in his alchemy mentor's voice
Alchemy was for the people, according to the old saying - but State Alchemist were weapon of war...
"I do. So that others won't have to." he said "You said it, I've already the eyes of a killer, so better me than someone who doesn't know what he's getting into."
"That's your only reason?"

An amused smirk "Of course not. It's just like you said, State Alchemist are military dog... But right now, this country is run by the military, and if we want to give back the alchemists to the people, then where better to work on it than among the military?"
"That's quite an ambition."
He had nodded, knowing of course, but already determined to see it through.

But after that discussion, his teacher had looked at him thoughtfully, and a few days after he won the silver watch, the emblem of the State Alchemists, he walked in his teacher's house library to be confronted by an unexpected sight.
"I feared, when you said you wanted to be a military dog, that you were like most of these idealistic youngster that are crushed by the system as soon as they understand what it really is to be a State Alchemist, but you proved me wrong..."

The old alchemist pointed at the intricate alchemical circle displayed in front of them "This is my greatest work. Memorize it, decrypt it and use it to change our country. Do not take regret in the blood you'll spill with your gift, but do not take pride in it either..."
His master died a few days later, asking only one last thing from him – that he took care of the daughter he was leaving behind.

"I hope you find what you're looking for."
These words surprised him, but he couldn't ask his now deceased alchemy tutor what he meant by them – or rather how he knew.
Because Roy Mustang was a man born with eyes too old, a fascination with fire, and the unshakable will to find something that constantly eluded him...